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Full-Text Articles in Life Sciences
Forest Management In A Changing Climate: Integrating Social And Biopysical Sciences To Inform Adaptive Responses To Future Uncertainty, Peter Breigenzer
Forest Management In A Changing Climate: Integrating Social And Biopysical Sciences To Inform Adaptive Responses To Future Uncertainty, Peter Breigenzer
Electronic Theses and Dissertations
Forests provide numerous ecological and socio-economic benefits, yet climate change is creating novel and extreme conditions that threaten forests and disrupt traditional management practices. To address future uncertainty about how to manage forests amid a rapidly changing climate, researchers have developed adaptive management strategies that move away from using historical ecological baselines as management goals. However, despite increases in adaptive forest management frameworks, there are still concerns that private woodland owners (PWOs; also known as family forest owners or non-industrial private landowners) are not adopting beneficial practices. Additionally, since tree canopies often buffer understory microclimates (i.e., fine scale variation in …
Influence Of Biochar As A Soil Amendment On Soil Water Content And Wild Blueberry Physiology, Abigayl Novak
Influence Of Biochar As A Soil Amendment On Soil Water Content And Wild Blueberry Physiology, Abigayl Novak
Electronic Theses and Dissertations
Maine wild (or lowbush) blueberries (Vaccinium angustifolium Ait.) continue to face challenges imposed by climate change. Reduced frequency of precipitation and increased drought conditions have negatively impacted this crop since it resides in sandy soils with limited retention of water and nutrients. The wild blueberry plants growing in water- and nutrient-poor sandy soils are likely to have poor resilience to drought, resulting in a decline in berry yield during drought years. Thus, there is an urgent need to find a drought management solution for wild blueberries. Compared with other drought management practices, such as irrigation systems, mulching, and adopting drought-resistant …
Tree Responses To Moderate And Extreme Drought In The Northeastern United States, Ruth A. Van Kampen
Tree Responses To Moderate And Extreme Drought In The Northeastern United States, Ruth A. Van Kampen
Electronic Theses and Dissertations
Climate change is expected to lead to novel drought conditions in the Northeastern United States. Therefore, experimental studies that mimic these conditions are crucial to understand the potential impact on forests. Further, recent large scale dendrochronological studies suggest that spring and summer droughts may immediately impact tree growth while fall droughts may cause delayed impacts on growth the following growing season. Therefore, in this study, we investigated the impacts of six-week-long spring, summer, and fall droughts on the physiology and intra-annual growth on 288 saplings of six tree species native to the Northeastern United States. These species (deciduous broadleaf angiosperms, …
The Ecological Resilience Of A Tropical Montane Pine Forest To Droughts, Fire, And Hurricane Disturbance, Daniel Erland Brugger Swann
The Ecological Resilience Of A Tropical Montane Pine Forest To Droughts, Fire, And Hurricane Disturbance, Daniel Erland Brugger Swann
Electronic Theses and Dissertations
Owing to the geographic isolation and unique climatic conditions which occur in tropical montane forests (TMFs), these systems are highly sensitive to changes in both climate and disturbance. Therefore, as ongoing climate change alters disturbance regimes – potentially facilitating multiple disturbance interactions much greater than that of isolated disturbances – TMFs may be shifted to alternate stable states. However, study of TMF resilience is essentially unknown given the lack of long-term studies in these systems. We address the resiliency of the tropical montane pine forests of the Cordillera Central, Dominican Republic using long-term climate records, remeasured vegetation data, and reconstructed …
The Future Of Maine's Forests Under Alternative Socioeconomic, Climate And Conservation Pathways, Jianheng Zhao
The Future Of Maine's Forests Under Alternative Socioeconomic, Climate And Conservation Pathways, Jianheng Zhao
Electronic Theses and Dissertations
Maine is a historically important timber supply region in North America and understanding the potential change in forestlands and their product industries affected by climate change and various socio-economic conditions can better improve the forest healthy and sustain a sustainable product industry. A statistical harvest choice model for the state of Maine was developed in chapter 1. It was estimated using a multinomial logit model of two products, under varying management intensities, and ownership classifications across varying market conditions. Results indicate that stumpage prices have a significant effect on forest landowners' harvest decisions and that the expansion of conservation land …
Exploring Historical Coffee And Climate Relations In Southern Guatemala: An Integration Of Tree Ring Analysis And Remote Sensing Data, Diego Pons
Electronic Theses and Dissertations
This dissertation makes use of a physical geography perspective to examine the relationship between agriculture and climate in Guatemala using dendrochronology. I examined the potential of high-resolution climate proxy data from dendrochronology to help fill in the gaps of past climate information to better understand the natural and anthropogenic variability of precipitation which, in turn, can inform Guatemala’s agriculture sector. This research has demonstrated successful cross-dating and climate sensitivity of Abies guatemalensis in the Pacific slope of Guatemala. Based on this, I have produced a 124-year record of mean precipitation from June-July-August. The mean precipitation from June-July-August at this site …